


Just Show Me Where To Dig

by freudiancascade



Category: Wolf 359 (Radio)
Genre: Arson, Emotional Hurt, Gen, Guns, and i think that's beautiful, in alien we don't say 'finale', started as 'the jacobi and lovelace revenge roadtrip' and turned into something bigger, tagged for canon-typical violence and character death, this kind of ran away with me?, we say 'everything hurts and i'm dying' instead, you know -- the usual hephaestus stuff
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-01-07
Updated: 2018-01-07
Packaged: 2019-03-01 13:36:03
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,085
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13295982
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/freudiancascade/pseuds/freudiancascade
Summary: [ON HIATUS]When Jacobi finally resurfaces, it's the dead of night. He’s semi-conscious from blood loss, clutching the biggest lead they’ve had in the six months since they touched back down on Earth, and pursued by the kind of very bad people that only Goddard Futuristics could dig up. Of course Lovelace seizes the chance to get revenge once and for all, and dives with him back into the abyss. It isn't even a question, much less up for debate.If only everything else could be that simple.Part one — featuring bad Starbucks orders, half a box of maxi pads, an old song that doesn’t bear repeating, and the whole gang being here.





	Just Show Me Where To Dig

**LOVELACE**

 

“Chai latte for Isabel!”  

The barista was much too chipper for that time of night, and Isabel Lovelace felt her blood run cold. Her hand went to her side, checking for the pistol kept beneath her clothing, concealed carry laws be damned, and only after she was certain she could draw it smoothly did she look up slowly and scan her surroundings with a practiced precision. 

Two teenagers sitting in front of the window in matching hoodies and skinny pants, one of them tapping on a silver laptop with teal keys and the other swiping absently at a small cell phone. A man in a dark suit taking up an entire booth meant for four, a paper cup of dark coffee gone cool at his elbow while he pecked away on a cell phone with too many buttons. Three baristas: one by the drive-through window, one at the drink counter, and one crouched down in front of the safe beneath the tills. A woman with large headphones gleaming in her glossy black hair, eyes closed. Maybe asleep. Maybe not. And then there, in the corner, a man sitting alone. With the hood of a dark sweater pulled up over his head and his shoulders bowed forwards, as though shielding himself from the room. Lovelace frowned. Squinted.

God, Jacobi needed a shave. And a haircut.

She stood up slowly, carefully, and wove between the mostly-empty tables. Hooked her foot around the leg of the chair opposite Jacobi, pulled it out, and sat down. “Hello, Daniel.”

He grunted once.

She took that as permission to continue. "Thanks for the drink, but you know you’re really not my type. Why are you — Oh. Well, that’s an awful lot of blood you've got there.” She leaned in closer, frowning. At this distance, he smelled of sweat and smoke. “Yours?”

Jacobi nodded once, and when he made eye contact she saw his face briefly contort with pain. “Not all of it. You should see the other guy.”

“Mmhmm. I’ll pass on that.” 

“Chai latte for Isabel?” the barista called again, her voice breaking a little bit.

Lovelace ignored her, pulling back to evaluate her former — what, former crewmate? Probably not friend. “Why are you here?”

Jacobi groaned. “Don’t make me say it.”

“Give it a try.”

“I don’t — look, I thought you’d probably want to see the dirt I dug up on _our mutual enemies_." 

“And?”

“…fine! I didn’t know where else to go. My old medical plan was through my employer, so....” He held her gaze, defiant for a long moment, and then dropped his head. His colour perceptibly shifted, face blanching from pain and blood loss, and Isabel made up her mind. 

She looped her arm around him, hauling him up. Jacobi’s breath caught with a hiss, and he allowed himself to be half-carried out the door.

When they reached the small bungalow, it was completely dark inside. Lovelace staggered into the backyard, wedging her shoulder against the gate with Jacobi heavy against her. Somewhere inside, Doug must have been…well, Lovelace had no idea what Doug’s sleep schedule looked like these days. That was one thing he’d shared in common with Eiffel, at least — keeping erratic hours. If he was awake, Hera was probably talking to him through one of the small spherical speakers they’d wired up to give her remote access to the house while her main processors remained safely hidden on the Urania. Those two were still as tight as ever, even after everything, and Lovelace was pretty sure that if she were the superstitious type she’d believe it was some kind of cosmic sign that most things would circle around eventually. And Renée was probably asleep in the quiet bedroom at the end of the hall that she and Isabel had shared for the last few months. Lord knew that woman had earned several lifetimes’ worth of rest, and had the nightmares to keep her from getting even a fraction’s worth of this one.

So, no reason to ruin the night for everybody else. She was quiet as she disengaged the security system with a thumb jabbed at the console. It lit green, and the back door clicked open.

“Lovelace?” Hera's voice came through the box, and then, “ _Jacobi!?_ "

“Yeah, we’ve got a houseguest. Don’t bother getting Renée or Doug up, I’ll handle him. He promised to be a good boy.” She dragged Jacobi across the kitchen — god, for such a wiry dude he sure was built like a ton of bricks — and hauled him up against the counter. “Shirt, off.”

"Aren't you supposed to buy me dinner first?"

“ _Jacobi_.”

“Fine, fine.” He began to peel off the sweater with a wince.

Lovelace turned away to retrieve the (absurdly well-stocked, thank you Renée) first aid kit from beneath the kitchen sink. Scrubbed her hands furiously under the tap. Made the mistake of looking back over her shoulder quickly, and frowned at the wounds Jacobi had been hiding beneath those dark clothes. "Wow, you patched yourself up like garbage. Is that half a box of maxi pads you’ve got taped on there, or are you happy to see me?”

“They hold a lot of blood,” he hissed, defiant as she crossed the kitchen towards him. “And of course I patched myself up like garbage, I was a little busy doing very important espion -- _shit, warn a guy when you do that_!"

"Calm down, you big baby," she muttered, squinting at the sopping wet sanitary napkin in her hand before setting it aside in disgust. “I’ll fix you up. Just lay down and stop squirming."

"Seriously? _Big baby_? I took a literal bullet getting good intel, and you're calling me a baby because yeah, turns out,  _getting shot freaking hurts_?"

“Look. If you were going to bleed to death you would have already done it.”

“Sure. Whatever.” All the same, he stretched himself out along the kitchen counter in response to her impatient wave of a hand, and Lovelace got to work.

 

* * *

**JACOBI**  

Breaking glass. The unmistakable rush of flame.

Jacobi's eyes flew open, from unconscious to fully lucid and ready to kick ass in the time it took his vision to focus on the unfamiliar ceiling above him. He was — oh, right, Lovelace and Eiffel and Minkowski’s house, he vaguely remembered getting stitched back up — oh, that’d be awkward later, must have passed out on the table and had to be carried to the — oh, damn it all to hell, the walls were definitely on fire.

He pulled himself off the couch with a grimace. Dropped to the carpet, reaching for his gun. Was briefly surprised that Lovelace hadn't confiscated it. Almost touched by the implicit trust he knew he hadn’t quite earned.

Shots rang out. Something crashed loudly in the hall, the pane of glass set into the front door exploded inwards, and something clattered to the floor and began filling the living room with a thick, choking smoke. Bodies moved in the front hall, taking advantage of the chaos, and then were gone. Lovelace came running down the hallway from the other direction, a look on her face that read fifty different kinds of murder; Jacobi raised his hands with his palms out.

“Get the crew, I’ll handle them!” he barked, now jerking his hand back over his shoulder.

Lovelace was apparently not going to argue either, nodding sharply and disappearing back into the bedroom. Jacobi turned around just in time to see the last heavy boot disappear up the ladder leading to the attic. Somebody familiar screamed in a very familiar way up above, and then a thud and sharp crack shook the roof over Jacobi's head. Smoke billowed. He followed.

The attic was dim, illuminated by a single small white light coming from an orb speaker in the corner. Indistinct shapes lined the low sloped walls, and the floorboards creaked under Jacobi's feet as he pulled himself up the ladder and launched himself forward into the space.

Doug Eiffel was squeaking into the floor. Flat on his stomach on the ground, his body contorted against the boot pressed between his shoulderblades. One assailant was clutching a baton and looking overly satisfied; the other one glanced up from the task of securing handcuffs around Doug's wrists to make eye contact with Jacobi across the small space. 

Jacobi felt his gut drop as he recognized him. _Oh, damn. I'd hoped Sklar and Josey would have had the sense to get out while they could_.

The same pang of recognition twisted the other man's features, feigned joviality as he called to his partner, "Hey, it’s Danny Boy! Fancy seeing you here! Long time no --"

Jacobi fired six shots. One at the head, two at the centre of mass, pivot, repeat. Both attackers dropped, that leer still frozen on Sklar's face. 

Eiffel uncurled from his spot on the ground, springing back to life as he rolled out from underneath the closest corpse. Bleeding from a scrape to the forehead, moving gingerly, probably busted a rib or two, didn't seem too badly hurt overall. It was only an awareness that this was Doug in front of him, not Eiffel, that kept Jacobi from yelling at him to _stop being useless and move your goddamn ass_. Giving the poor guy a panic attack wouldn't help anything, and god, Jacobi was so not in the mood for this flashback. It was an old song, or at least one he’d heard once already, Eiffel blinking at him like a deer in the headlights with two unconscious bodies by his side, and now Jacobi didn’t even have the benefit of zero gravity to help drag everybody who needed to be dragged to safety. And the fresh stitches he could feel burning against his side didn’t love the idea, either.

Instead he swallowed hard, lowered the gun as he advanced and offered a hand to steady Eiffel. Spoke deliberately and as slow as he could manage, in a measured tone. “Eiffel — Doug, can you walk?"

The man shook his head, wide-eyed, and then reconsidered and nodded slow. Glanced quickly at one of the bodies in front of him, then the other one, and then back at Jacobi. Opened his mouth, and then closed it. Shook his head. Clambered to his feet without accepting the help, knees shaking. "I'm fine? Holy geez. Okay. That's. A lot. Hera?"

"I'm here, Doug," she said from the glowing speaker two feet away, voice muffled as the microphone had landed face-down.

Jacobi sighed, automatically retrieving Hera and dropping her into one of the pockets of Doug's pyjama pants. "Great. Whole gang's here. Glad to hear it."

"You knew those guys!?"

"Old co-workers. Look -- you might have noticed that things are on fire, and we need to go." He checked his gun, frowning. People like those two goons were not smart enough for SI-5, but the next best thing in terms of brute force. Which was very, very bad. "Stay behind me, keep low. Got it?"

"Wilco," Eiffel replied automatically, the military verbiage jumping to him without hesitation. Must have been listening to those tapes again, but Jacobi wasn’t going to spare another thought on that. Instead he led the way down the ladder again and into the smoke-filled house, choking — barely remembered the layout, but managed to move back towards the kitchen where Lovelace had tended his wounds and back to the door.

And then they were outside, and the air was fresher, and they staggered across the side of the house to where the Commander was standing.

Jacobi saw Eiffel shoot like a bullet to Minkowski's side. The woman steadied herself against his shoulders, words were presumably exchanged, and then she latched her hand tight around Eiffel's arm and began tugging the man back across the backyard to where Lovelace was waiting. The three of them clustered together; Minkowski kept one hand anchored just above Eiffel’s wrist while the other found Lovelace's fingers and squeezed tight. Lovelace plucked Hera out of Eiffel's pocket and held her up to face the blaze, the glow of her speaker illuminating three tired faces. Jacobi kept a safe distance, knowing instinctively that this wasn't his moment to intrude.

The alien, the commander, the artificial intelligence, and the amnesiac stood on their front lawn, silhouetted by flames, and watched the life they'd tried to rebuild burn.

And Jacobi watched them in turn, wondering if he was supposed to feel anything other than exhausted by the storm about to come.

**Author's Note:**

> They say there's good grief,  
> But how can you tell it from the bad?  
> Maybe it's only in the fact  
> Good grief's the one that's in your past
> 
> Title comes from “Good Grief,” by Dessa. Dare you to listen to that track and NOT get super emotional about Isabel Lovelace, Daniel Jacobi, or any of the crew of the Hephaestus trying to figure out what on earth they’re going to do with themselves now that they’re, uh, literally back on earth.
> 
> All the thanks to @intrikate88 for instigating this, lending me the Starbucks gag, and letting me yell into her inbox about my ideas and emotions at all hours of the day and night.
> 
> More to come soon.


End file.
